


Never Makes Deals in Nightmares

by RiYuYami



Series: Pulling Strings [36]
Category: Bendy and the Ink Machine
Genre: Joey isn't the only villain in this story, There's more to the ink than originally thought, pre-story events
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-24
Updated: 2019-08-24
Packaged: 2020-09-25 18:35:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,558
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20376232
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RiYuYami/pseuds/RiYuYami
Summary: Joey Drew was a man who people claimed to have a huge ego, who was blinded to his actions and their consequences. That he never saw the error of his ways or felt remorse for what he did.Oh, he wasn’t blind, but he did try to ignore them, even if he couldn't.But he knows he can’t run away from them forever, can’t fix them either, but someone else can fix his mistakes for him, before he makes more. Before.... it makes more.





	Never Makes Deals in Nightmares

**Author's Note:**

> I’ve been wanting to write this since May, and with recent events and the upcoming release of Dreams Come to Life, I figured it was time for an update. Why I never got around to it? Cause writing it a pain and I've been trying to work out other things for Chapter Five content to get the rest of this story finished.
> 
> Also, if anything I’m writing is actually canon to the games, holy shit, if not, oh well! I’ve had a lot of this planned from when I first started writing up this au back in 2017! I mean, I've made hints to things through a number of drabbles with Henry and such, but now it's time to see what the ink had done to Joey.
> 
> I figure ink influences people, and I’ve done different things with it in this au and Ink Spots before, so here’s some more theorized content for ya.
> 
> On with the fic!
> 
> EDIT: Thanks for the block of text, ao3, you posted just fine earlier, what made you turn my story into one freaking paragraph?

It had started as a dream, where something spoke to him from the darkness of a strange place, that Joey didn’t understand.

He remembered the dream, it happened shortly after the Ink Machine began being built, when he looked over his old notes and such on summing circles and the like that he remembered from his grandfather’s old spell book. The dream had him in a darkened room, it was endless, but he felt like there were walls as he trudged through what could have been water, or sludge, it felt like both.

As he walked, he saw something in the darkness, somehow. Joey watched as something rose from the liquid, it was a shapeless being, constantly moving and shifting. It spoke in a voice that sounded like one, yet sounded like dozens all at once.

_**“Do you wish to make your dreams come true?”**_ It had asked. _**“I can make them happen, for a price.” **_

“Yes… but what is it that you want in return?”

_**“A host.”**_ Joey had been confused by that.

“A host? Do you mean… a body? I-I suppose with the machine we can make you a body!”

_**“No…”** _The thing had spoke, leaning in closer, Joey remembered being uncomfortable, it smelled strange, even with his nearly perfect memory, he can’t recall what it smelled like. He just remembered it nearly made him vomit in his own dream.

He swallowed the lump in his throat. “Do you mean…?” He pointed at himself.

_ **“I need you, to host me, so that we can make your dreams a reality. You want to keep you promise, yes? Even though he left?” ** _

That had alarmed Joey. “How do you know that?!”

It had the nerve to laugh.

**“I know much, so much, you putting magic into things lets me observe you. Especially when you put magic in the ink…”** It had hit Joey then and there, he was standing in ink.

**"Help me, and I’ll help you,”** it continued, **"I won’t abandon you, Joey. I’ll be there for you until the end, when everything is perfect, or when you’re ready to stop… it's up to you.”**

Joey had been too quick, he realized years later, he didn’t stop to think of what could go wrong. He agreed just seconds later, and the thing had pulled him into the ink. He remembered tasting it on his tongue, of swallowing it, he woke up gagging and trying to scream.

From then on, he felt something always sitting in his stomach and in his chest, it was there, inside of him, ‘helping’ him as the machine was built, as he used its magic to better create with the ink. Joey had thought that this thing he made a deal with was just simply giving his magic more power, but it took him so long to realize that it was doing so much more.

Too bad for him he discovered this fact when it was too late to fix or change what he’s done. Yet it gave him progress… for the cost of so much. Every Boris and Alice, they came out nearly perfect, but the Ink, as he called it, always told him to add more to them. They were nearly toy-like, they weren’t like their counterparts, except for one of each, but the Ink said it wasn’t enough.

Add souls.

Joey had been on autopilot. He watched from his own eyes but he was having trouble with keeping control over himself. He didn’t think much of it at the time, he thought it was just what his spells and such did to him when he was casting them, but it was the Ink controlling his actions, using his knowledge, his mind, his soul, and giving him just enough free will to think he still had control, and to feel horrible about it later when Joey finally realized what had happened. The Ink was careful to make sure that Joey felt like he was in control, that these actions were his, but the Ink was smart to play him like a fiddle as it used him to control the studio from the shadows through Joey’s actions.

All for the chance to get souls for whatever it had planned for Joey’s so-called dreams. Joey began with cursing the ink in the studio’s pipes, the inkwells, watching as people were stained and waiting for them to be trapped in the ink eventually.

Sammy was quick, his sanity already damaged by the Ink trying to talk to him, and turning him into a collector, a prophet, gathering people and taking them to Joey. The director could never really remember all the details of events, but he remembered Norman’s transformation. He remembered slitting Susie’s throat after she begged to be an Alice when she found out what was happening, she had come out perfect, only to suddenly panic when she realized that she was still Susie, her mind still intact, she turned into a monster that tried to perfect herself as she lost her mind.

Allison… she shouldn’t have gotten involved, she should have stayed away, but the Ink wanted to make up for its mistakes with Susie, it made her into the true Perfect Alice, a terrible splicing between Perfect Alice and the poor actress. Thomas was revenge. Those brown, pie cut eyes still keep Joey awake at night, the rage and betrayal in them…

He remembered Buddy, that poor boy… oh, oh Joey had wished that he hadn’t gotten curious, Joey actually tried to get him to escape, but the Ink was tricky, knew Joey was up to something, and used him as a puppet to trick Buddy. It had been a strange experiment, the Ink had decided, using Joey and a controlled Bendy to fuse the Perfect Boris with Buddy into a better Boris.

Bendy remembers nothing.

Bendy… Oh, that poor Toon.

Joey didn’t blame the Ink for everything that happened to Bendy, some of that was his own anger, his own hate, a lot of those clones were killed because of him, not just because of the Ink. But the memory wiping, that was Joey, he couldn’t bare for Bendy to remember. Turning off the machine and tricking the devil, that was the Ink. The Ink hated Bendy, cause he was never perfect, he never could be. Bendy wasn’t like the other ink beings in the studio, he was special. He was the first creation of the Ink Machine and Joey had made sure to use the special ink he had given Henry and himself used for it, he thought it would be the right choice. Bendy was always, always made with special ink, never the Ink. But that never stopped the strange substance. It claims that Bendy had a few drops of it inside of him, just a little, mixed with the ink he was made of.

It was in Bendy, but it had no true control over him, just a manipulation of Bendy’s emotions, the Toon had always been sensitive, thanks to how he was written.

Good going, Henry, making such a gullible creation…

Speaking of the animator, Joey looked at the note in front of him, it was done being written, and he knew he was going to get up to send it to his old friend. But the part of him that knew this was wrong… it protested loudly in his head. He couldn’t drag Henry into this, the Ink was going to send that man to his death! He had blamed Henry for everything for so long, until he realized that he was trapped in this old studio, trapped with his sins, he was just as trapped here as Bendy was in the Ink Machine.

The Ink needed the studio, it had tied itself to the place, but Joey wanted to leave. He could, but he couldn’t be gone for too long. His health got worse and worse the more he tried to get away, to the point that he would die if he stayed out more than a day. The studio was his home now, he was trapped, hidden away in areas that he kept blocked off, coming out only when he needed to, when he knew the Toons and monsters wouldn’t notice.

The Ink was not a fan when he left, it tried to eat him from the inside out, but it was willing to ease up a bit to let him send this letter. It wanted Henry here, for reasons Joey didn’t quite understand. But he knew that it had to do with the Ink Machine, Joey’s free will was limited now, but strong enough to prevent the Ink from activating the machine.

But it wanted Henry to come here, Henry could do it. Henry could free ‘Bendy’ and then the Ink would have what it wants. And Joey theorized that what it wants is a Perfect Bendy, and to get that, it needs Henry’s soul.

With a hefty sigh, Joey grabbed the letter, feeling the Ink move his hands, making him roll his chair towards the door. Oh Henry, forgive him, he didn’t ask for this, but damnit, he was stuck with his faults and sins, can’t blame the Ink for everything.

He too wanted a Perfect Bendy, and he was determined to make his dreams come true, no matter the cost.

**Author's Note:**

> Joey is still a villain, but he's a villain of circumstances.
> 
> He was on the verge of breaking for months after he last saw Henry, but the Ink decided to play on a damaged soul and HOO BOY! Look how that turned out.
> 
> Thanks for reading! Please comment and kudos!


End file.
